Han Yu’s fate was now sealed.
He wasn’t a glorious prodigy of the sect.He wasn’t a future powerhouse.
He wasn’t even a morable footnote.
He was just a servant.
One among hundreds. Naless, rankless, and dood to carry buckets, scrub floors, and probably wrestle with pigs in the mud pits of the outer courts.
Forever forgotten by the sect.
...At least until he did sothing stupid again.
Which, knowing Han Yu, probably wouldn’t take long.
He continued to trail behind the group of new servants as Disciple Bian led the way and explained the rules of their new reality.
"Listen to carefully. I’ll only say this once," Disciple Bian said, his voice firm and his patience already wearing thin.
"Y-Yes!" the children replied, voices tinged with nervous energy.
"I’ll start with your status," he said, with all the enthusiasm of soone explaining taxes to a group of puppies.
While there was no official servant ranking system, an unwritten hierarchy existed—one that all servants lived by, feared, and were inevitably crushed under.
At the bottom of the barrel—below the barrel, really—were the fresh recruits. The newbies. The cannon fodder of nial labor. These poor souls got the absolute worst jobs: latrine duty, sweeping the roads constantly littered with spiritual leaves, dust, and the occasional wandering chicken. Basically, anything disgusting or humiliating had their nas written all over it in bold calligraphy.
Just above them were the mid-level servants—the ones who had survived for a year or two without either dying or going insane. They got slightly better jobs, like cleaning disciple residences, hauling water, fetching items, and occasionally being yelled at for no reason.
These were known as the "junior servants," or as the veterans called them, "the moderately dood."
Then ca the senior servants. These old-tirs had been around for at least ten years and gained so small speck of authority—though only over other servants. They handled more skilled duties like cooking, tailoring, gardening, and running errands. So even got to relay ssages without being slapped.
But at the peak of servant society—on the very summit of Mount Peasant—were the personal servants of disciples.
These were handpicked by the disciples themselves, both Outer Court and Inner Court. Though, let’s be honest, being picked by an Outer Court disciple was like being chosen as the "least worst" option in a pie-eating contest where all the pies were on fire.
Outer Court disciples had minimal inco, so they couldn’t afford full-ti servants. They just assigned random tasks whenever needed. Inner Court disciples, on the other hand, had decent inco and occasionally—very occasionally—kept a full-ti servant or two.
Of course, the competition to beco a personal servant was savage.
Servants would put on their best smiles, shine their shoes till they could see their past regrets in them, and taphorically (sotis literally) kiss the boots of Inner Court disciples just for the chance to carry their laundry.
For female servants, playing the "beauty card" was a known tactic. If they looked decent enough, they might try their luck seducing a disciple to beco a maid. Better to serve tea while smiling than to clean pig dung with tears in your eyes.
For male servants, though? The road was full of traps, humiliation, and rejection. They had to use every trick in the book—and then so extra tricks they wrote in the margins—to even get noticed.
But becoming a personal servant wasn’t all rainbows and spirit stones.
Sure, the benefits could be good: better housing, better food, and the privilege of standing slightly closer to soone important. But the risks? Oh, the risks.
First, there was the jealousy. Other servants would sche endlessly. If you got promoted, you might find your shoes missing, your bedding soaked, or rumors swirling faster than Qi through a Golden Core. Backstabbing? Standard. Snitching? Routine. Poisoned dumplings? Tuesday.
And if the inner-circle drama wasn’t bad enough, there were still external threats.
Enemies of your master—whether rival disciples or jealous sect mbers—might decide to use you as a punching bag. Because let’s be real: punishing a servant was cheap, easy, and involved little to no consequences. A few spirit stones here, a fake apology there, and everything would be swept under the very floor you just cleaned.
Assassination? Mugging? Sudden boot to the spine? Entirely possible.
But even that wasn’t the scariest part.
The real horror ca from within.
Specifically, from the disciple you served.
Because disciples ca in all shapes and moral alignnts. So were upright, noble cultivators who’d rather slap themselves than swear in public. Others... were sleazy scoundrels who treated rules the sa way pigs treated bath water.
So male disciples had hands that seed to wander whenever a female servant walked by. Others used servants as stress relief dummies—like punching bags with legs.
If you ended up with one of those? You might envy the newbie still cleaning septic tanks.
There were servants who couldn’t take it anymore and chose to take the "quick ascension route" to the afterlife. If they couldn’t cultivate to reach the heavens, they figured they’d just... skip the cultivation part altogether.
Disciple Bian laid it all out. No sugarcoating. No kind words. Just raw, brutal honesty wrapped in sarcasm and topped with despair.
Why?
Because despite his tough exterior and evident contempt for his job, the man still had a scrap of humanity buried sowhere in there. He didn’t want these kids walking in blind and getting taphorically—or literally—stabbed.
It was the least courtesy he could offer.
And sure enough, once the children heard everything, their expressions turned pale. Several looked ready to cry. A few already regretted being born.
One even mumbled sothing about rather being a farr.
But there was no escape now.
The only way out of the sect was in a coffin. Deluxe package available for those who died in service.
Their fates were now chained to the sect—glorified janitors in a world of sword-slinging immortals.
There was no quitting.
They either lived out the rest of their days as invisible background characters, praying for a miracle promotion—or they gave up and t the maker early.
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